Storymania - An Unhealthy Case Of Paranoia by Glen Pearson

An Unhealthy Case Of Paranoia
Glen Pearson

The two lads entered the pub. It was the third one of the night and one that was usually avoided due to the fact that its regular clientele were middle-aged to old piss-heads. But Larry had insisted that it was the closest and Pete had been in no mood to argue.
Earlier in the evening Larry had called Pete on his mobile to ask if he fancied going out for a few pints. Pete, who had just taken a tab of acid, had said that he just wanted to stay in and watch a couple of videos. But Larry’s insistent whining on the phone had begun to get on Pete’s nerves and so he had reluctantly agreed, as long as they went down to The Old Bone. This was Pete’s favourite place (other than home) to chill in; the music was always cool, down-tempo stuff and the décor was nice and bizarre: posters of bands from the ‘60s coupled with strange puppets and streamers hanging from the ceiling.
Once Pete had become settled in The Old Bone, however, Larry had gone on one again. Pete was content to wait for the acid to kick in and just stare at the ceiling but Larry had other ideas. He didn’t like The Old Bone. There were hardly any nice women in The Old Bone. There were too many “dodgy rastas” in The Old Bone. The music in The Old Bone would only be any good if you were “drugged-up”. Pete wondered absently (whilst a red dragon on a string twirled slowly, lazily) why Larry had agreed to come here in the first place.
So they’d finished their pints and gone on to the second pub of the evening. Pete had explained to Larry about the acid when the stupid fucker had kept on moaning that Pete was being too quiet. Larry was not impressed, even when Pete explained that that was why he hadn’t wanted to come out in the first place. Larry hadn’t said anything else in the five minutes it had taken to get to the next pub.

Hatchett’s. Loads of fit birds with their tits hanging out and mini-skirts barely covering their arses. And loads of tossers wearing designer gear lining up ready to shag them in a dark doorway or car-park later on in the evening. At least this was always the case on a Friday or Saturday. Today was Tuesday.
The only customers were Larry, Pete and a bunch of suited wankers talking business around a couple of pushed-together tables.
Larry had finally spoken to Pete, if only to tell him that it was his round and to get the beers in whilst he went for a shit. Pete had gone up to the bar and ordered two Stellas, avoiding eye contact with the barman. He’d had a feeling that he wouldn’t like what he saw if he had have of done. But it had been getting harder and harder for Pete to look at anything. Strange shapes shimmered inside the well-polished bar-top. Heads had threatened to change shape if he stared into the mirror on the other side of the bar for too long. Luckily one of the racked up bottles of spirit had blocked Pete’s own reflection but even there he hadn’t been sure if the level of liquid inside had been moving up and down or not.
When the barman had put the two beers in front of him Pete had fumbled about in his wallet for the money. The right money had been there, in change, but the coins had somehow kept slipping away from his fingers. A five-pound note had hastily been handed to the barman before he could surmise how fucked Pete was getting; his change transferred to a jeans pocket to avoid further embarrassment.
By the time Larry had got back Pete had almost finished his pint. Two more swallows and he had. Pete had explained to Larry that he was feeling a bit “fucked-up” and that alcohol was the only way to get rid of the effects. Larry responded by buying Pete a triple vodka and announcing that they would go on a pub-crawl.
After a pint and an extra shot each, they had left for the next pub, Pete starting to get his head together and Larry starting to get a bit merry.

And now here they were. Larry had already taken a piss in the street on the way here but Pete needed to go now.
The pub was a small shit-hole, half-filled with about a dozen smelly, alcoholic old cunts. The bare walls held no indication of where the toilets were and none of the doors at the end of the pub were marked. Pete was forced to ask some middle-aged geezer where the toilets were. The bloke in question was currently mouthing off to his companion about some fifty-quid bet or something. Pete tapped him on the shoulder. He whirled round and glared at Pete. Pete could have sworn that some grease had flicked off of the bloke’s hair into his face, or maybe it was just phlegm.
“Don’t interrupt and I won’t think you’re interfering, right?” snarled the man. Pete wasn’t sure if it was a statement or a question but he had a bad feeling about this bloke and the pub in general. The bloke looked like he’d had more than his fair share of fights over the years and this was his regular drinking haunt. Pete had read somewhere that the only way to get good at beating the fuck out of some-one was to beat the fuck out of a lot of some-ones, and this old cunt had no doubt had a hell of a lot more practice than he had.
Pete nodded slowly and tried not to notice the touchy bastard appraising him with a glare. The bloke then turned towards Larry, who was now at the bar, as if marking him too. Pete decided to leave the old weirdo to his argument and made his way to the area of the pub containing the doors.
His luck was in. As Pete approached the doors a stubbly fat bastard came through one of them. A gentle waft of piss came with him. Pete let the sweaty bloke pass and went in.
“Whoa fuck!” exclaimed Pete, involuntarily. The entire world was all of sudden some surreal nightmare. The toilet area was a strange, barely lit place, underground somewhere. Some unseen flickering light-bulb caused the walls to glow in various shades of blue. He’d been here before some time, maybe in a dream or another life perhaps. Soon some great mass of flood-water would surge into the place, enveloping him, drowning him, he could feel it coming –
A toilet flushed ahead of him, snapping Pete out of his trance. Other than stinking a bit more than usual, the toilet area was completely normal. Pete quickly made his way over to the urinals before whoever had pulled the chain came out. He could do without being seen staring into space in the middle of the gent’s, especially in this place.
He unzipped and began the start of what seemed to be the world’s longest urination. Pete was mildly aware that no one had actually left any of the stalls after the toilet had been flushed. But then he couldn’t be sure that that had actually happened at all, maybe it just been part of his strange vision.
Halfway through his piss he noticed the breathing. It was behind him somewhere, in the stalls. If there had been a mirror above the urinals he might have been able to see something without turning around. But someone’s head or fist had smashed the reflecting implement apart long before, the only testament to its existence being a set of screws equally placed apart in the wall in front of him.
This was getting more than a bit creepy. Pete wanted to just get the fuck out of here but his dick just wouldn’t stop pissing. He realised that what he thought was breathing was more like panting, or very heavy breathing. Resisting the urge to turn round, Pete tried to just concentrate on relieving himself.
The rate of panting increased from behind him, although thankfully still from the same distance away. Pete finally finished and zipped himself up. Turning round, he glanced towards the stalls.
In the only stall without a door, some hideous old fucker sat on the toilet with his trousers round his ankles. An oft-broken nose spread across his face above a dribbling, fat slug of a mouth. His eyes, magnified grotesquely through his glasses, glared at Pete with lunatic intensity. Spittle sprayed down his T-shirt whilst he panted furiously, all the while staring at Pete whilst he masturbated without abandon.
Pete’s mind did a somersault. He had to leave this fucked-up place. He didn’t know if the bloke was real or not but that manic stare and the throbbing right hand were real enough for him to want to get the fuck out of here.
Pete mentally slapped himself across the face and tore his gaze away from the disturbingly compelling scene. After a single step, however, he heard a cry of pain and couldn’t help but look back.
Creamy white semen dribbled through the wanker’s hand whilst he giggled in his own lunacy, all the while maintaining eye contact with those sickly, magnified eyes.
Pete somehow managed to stop himself running when he got through the toilet door.

“What the fuck happened to you, man?” asked Larry in his usual petulant voice. “I’ve been sat ‘ere on me own for fucking ages.”
“Ah, jus’ needed a long piss, like,” answered Pete. His eyes roved around the bar, expecting more strange images to assail him. A number of drinkers were staring at him and Larry but that was about it, and, given the situation, to be expected.
“Yeah, well, took your time, di’n’t ya! There’s me fancying a game a pool, but I got two fucking pints in front of me. For all I know some old duffer’d drop his teeth in ya pint if I went to ‘ave a game!”
“Ah, don’t be fuckin’ stupid,” Pete was still understandably edgy, but he could never let himself be put down by Larry’s ridiculous remarks, no matter what kind of state he was in. “Anyway, who the fuck are ya gonna play against?”
“I dunno” slurred Larry, “jus’ fancied a game, tha’s’all.”
Pete downed a large gulp of his beer. It tasted like piss.
“Fuckin’ ‘ell this tastes like piss, La’,” he said with a bravado that he didn’t feel in the slightest. “Let’s go somewhere else.”
“Look, Pete. I know you’re feeling a bit ‘fucked-up’ because of that stupid shit ya took earlier, man. But don’t let it get to ya. Someone told me once that ya just gotta go with it, man, jus’ like enjoy it, instead of going all stupid and fucking paranoid.”
“Yeah, and the what the fuck would you know?”
“Ay, come on, man. You know I wou’n’t go near that shit. I was jus’ saying-”
“Yeah, well you’re always jus’ fuckin’ 'saying’. All I fuckin’ wanted to do tonight was watch some videos on me acid and jus’ fuckin’ be cool, ya know? Instead I wind up in some shitty boozer with every fucker in ‘ere givin’ me the -”
Pete stopped. He hadn’t realised that he had been raising his voice. Now every fucker in the pub was staring at him.
“You stupid cunt,” said Larry.
Pete didn’t reply. Every pair of eyes he looked at reminded him of those bulging, magnified eyes in their frenzied stare. Staring at him. But now, instead of staring with some warped sexual fascination, all eyes glared with the desire to rip him apart.
Larry slapped Pete’s face.
“Earth to Pete, earth to fuckin’ Pete.” He waved his hand in front of Pete’s face in an effort to get Pete out of his trance. Fucking hell, if that bloke had seen Pete staring at him like that he’d probably have lumped him one.
Pete shook his head and quickly turned his head around. No one was staring at him, or Larry. For some strange reason this was not much of a relief to him.
“I’ll tell ya what Pete,” offered Larry with a sigh, “if this place is doing ya head in that much we’ll go in a bit, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, sure.” Pete half-smiled and attempted a sip at his pint. It still tasted of piss, hallucinations or no hallucinations.
Somehow Larry had managed to down his however, and he informed Pete of his need to go to the toilet before they left.
“What door is it then, man?” Larry asked.
“Oh, the middle one….wait, don’t go in there!” Pete tried to keep his voice down but he couldn’t stop a note of urgency entering his voice.
“Ay, calm down, man. I won’t be a sec and then we’ll fuck off, alright?”
Pete was about to tell Larry about the wanker in the toilets but then decided he didn’t want to look any more stupid than he no doubt already did. Larry left.

Pete sipped at his foul-tasting brew. What the fuck was happening to him? He’d been convinced that the worst was over since leaving Hatchett’s. Now all this shit.
His nervousness increased as the seconds passed. He tried not to look up, because every time he did it seemed that at least one person was staring at him. All he could think about was obscene, white fluid spurting between gnarled, old fingers.
Someone stood in front of Pete’s table. Looking up, Pete noticed that it wasn’t Larry but some balding, grey-haired bloke with some big piece of plastic in his ear. The bloke was making some strange hand motions whilst looking at him. Pete was convinced the old cunt was taking the piss out of him, although he didn’t know how, or why, maybe it had something to do with that weirdo in the toilets.
The old bloke’s left hand began to make wanking motions and a grin spread across his face. He was taking the piss out of Pete! Maybe he’d been in there the whole time, watching from one of the other stalls! Pete wanted to say something, but didn’t want to offend anyone in the pub who might want to beat the shit out of him.
What was it that other bloke had said? ‘Don’t interrupt….’? Pete looked around the bar to see if anyone else was joining this old fucker in ridiculing him.
They all were. Some of the blokes he looked at were either rubbing their crotch or making obscene hand gestures in the air. Others just grinned at him, some gestured towards him. Everyone was staring at him.
Pete screamed, jumped up from his seat and knocked the table over with his thighs. The bloke in front of him fell to the floor gesticulating wildly. Pete ran from the pub, shrugging off attempts to grab him. He didn’t stop until he got home.

Larry came out of the toilets. He’d heard a scream but wasn’t sure if it had been Pete or not.
A hand grabbed his shoulder.
“What the bloody ‘ell’s up with your friend?” asked some pissed-up, red-faced old alky. Spit sprayed Larry’s cheeks as the man spoke, his face inches from Larry’s.
“Dunno. Why?”
“Old Deaf John just went to ask him if he fancied a game of pool and the bloke just screamed and ran out the bloody pub!”
“Er. Maybe he just had a bit too much to drink or something.”
“Yeah, well bloody weird it was!”
“Weird? I’ll tell ya what’s fucking weird, man. You’ve got some sick old cunt passed out in the fucking bogs. He’s sat in the only cubicle without a fucking door with his trousers round his fucking ankles!
“Fuck knows what the old cunt was doing!”